Mirabel
Mirabel Miller was the older sister of Christabel Miller, and a former resident of Darkholm. She was directly involved in the events that led to the rediscovery, and subsequent assembly, of the ancient World-Breaker. Mirabel was the eldest daughter of Ulric Miller, having worked in her father's paper mill in Darkholm for most of her life. She was five or six years old when Christabel was born. As a child, Mirabel once went exploring through the marsh lands with some friends and accidentally stumbled upon the nesting grounds for some goblins. (The experience would later give her the idea to return there when she found herself in need of a ship's complement.) At age 18 or 19, Mirabel decided to leave home, a turn of events that proved emotionally devastating for her father. Mirabel and Christabel had not been particularly close, and Mirabel made no contact with them after she left. Standing at 5' 2", Mirabel bore a striking physical resemblance to Christabel. She lacked her sister's technical skills, but she possessed a talent for deception, and was not above using her feminine wiles to manipulate others. The Quest for the World-Breaker After Christabel was appointed Mistress of Science in Torlynn Castle, Mirabel learned of Christabel's discovery that the Moon's orbit had become unstable. Christabel recorded her findings in a journal, which she eventually hid in the new airship she had been working on. After Christabel's death, Mirabel arranged to secure the unfinished airship for herself. She contacted Forever the dragon and agreed to pay him one thousand gold ingots if he would sneak into the castle, abscond with the airship, and make the castle's denizens forget that they saw him. Forever agreed only because he detected Christabel's scent on the airship and, mistaking it for Mirabel's, assumed that she was the rightful owner of the craft. Mirabel paid the dragon a down payment but never followed through with the other half. Using the notes she found in her sister's journal, Mirabel was able to get the airship operational, which she named Xanthippe, though it was still prone to malfunctions and required frequent stops for repairs. She enlisted a crew of goblins as her ship's crew, promising Puke-Eater and the others revenge on Torlynn Castle to avenge their oppressed ancestors in exchange for their services aboard the ship. Mirabel shouted at them constantly, reasoning that they despised weakness and that a show of verbal abuse was necessary to win their respect. Mirabel also learned about Christabel's fondness for a person named Four, whom she had written about frequently. At some point, Mirabel learned that the Dwarves had unearthed an ancient artifact in Stonekeep, a fragment of the weapon known as the World-Breaker. Recognizing it as a tool by which she might destroy the Moon and stop it from colliding with the Earth, Mirabel traded a chunk of valuable diamondite to the Dwarves in exchange for their piece of the weapon. Mirabel then began searching for the remaining parts in order to reassemble the device, utilizing the goblins' acute sense of smell to determine the other locations. Mirabel had competition from the Moth Dominion in her search for the pieces of the weapon. Frequently, her crew was spotted leaving a possible artifact site just as the moths arrived. The moths came to know Mirabel's group as The Travelers. Mirabel also discovered Christabel to be very much alive, having been transformed into a terragon following her consumption of dragon's blood given to her by Forever. By Mirabel's account, Christabel broke out of her own grave as a baby dragon, terrorizing the citizens of Darkholm before Mirabel found her and took her aboard Xanthippe. Mirabel would later explain that her intent was to keep Christabel the dragon safe, though she kept the dragon, which she called Baby, in chains below decks, feeding it only enough to keep it alive and using its ability to project psychic bursts to her advantage. One such instance was when Xanthippe flew within proximity to the Golden Desert, where the Royal Knights of Torlynn had launched an attack on the Moth Dominion. Affected by Baby's mental projections, the knights were unable to accurately recall what had happened to King Wheeler after he disappeared from the fight. During a maintenance shop, "Four" Wheeler, the erstwhile King of Torlynn, snuck aboard the ship, intending to reclaim it. Mirabel was unable to stop the goblin crew from accosting him and attempting to throw him overboard. The goblins traced his scent to the Great Divide, where Mirabel recovered him, nursing him back to health aboard the ship. Though he was reluctant at first, Mirabel eventually convinced Four to join her in her quest to find the pieces of the World-Breaker. Four would argue with Mirabel about the course they set, the methods they used, and even the true name of the airship. Mirabel, meanwhile, proceeded to deceive Four about a great many things—not the least of which was keeping the true identity of Baby from him. In the interim, they continued to recover parts of the World-Breaker, one of them near the Darklands from pixie clan leader Nyx and another from Copycat Rock. When the goblin crew decided to mutiny, Mirabel and Four escaped Xanthippe aboard the aerial lifeboat, landing close to Torlynn Castle. Four was promptly arrested for murder, leaving Mirabel to reconnoiter with the goblins. Under her command once more, Xanthippe attacked the castle, under which the final piece of the World-Breaker was buried. Mirabel used a breech-loader to blast through the hidden chamber where it was located. After Four was freed from the dungeon and confronted her, Mirabel emptied the remains of the breech-loader's shrapnel into his gut and absconded back to the ship with the final piece. Unbeknownst to Mirabel, High Priestess Axziss had snuck aboard the ship. When she emerged, Mirabel confronted her but was eventually forced to jump ship, the trees of the castle orchard breaking her fall. She encountered the disembodied head of Syzygy, who warned Mirabel of the dangers of the World-Breaker's activation. Dazed and disoriented from the fall and confused by the existence of a talking wooden head, Mirabel nonetheless found Four and his other companions in time to convey Syzygy's warning that the weapon was incapable of launching and would explode on Earth. Mirabel then absconded with Syzygy's head to parts unknown. The Curse of the Fate Shifter In the months that followed, Mirabel curried favor with the Elves of the Elvenwood, becoming the concubine to Elladan. She remade her image, dying her hair black and gaining weight in order to appear as exotic and alluring as possible to him. He eventually entrusted her with an Elven talisman, which she would later use to break the seal on the Ancient One's tomb, freeing the demon. Mirabel then retreated to Altus Rock, a town close enough to the Dwarf settlement of Stonekeep to allow her to establish a rapport with the Dwarves, particularly the clan leader Gerrick. She distinguished regular old diamonds from the far more rare and valuable diamondite, providing the precious commodity to the Dwarves in return for their camraderie and, eventually, access to the Digger machine. She intended to offer her services to the Dwarves so that they could recapture the Ancient One. It was Mirabel's plan to seize control of the Digger and use it to burrow holes into the Earth, magically jettisonning the resultant debris into space. She hoped this shift in the Earth's mass would be sufficient to change its orbit and prevent its collision with the Moon. Mirabel also attempted to rebuild Syzygy, having collected most of his component parts. Lacking the knowledge and materials to effect a full reassembly, Mirabel had been forced to improvise, cobbling together a new arm and leg for him and fastening his body together with staples and tourniquettes and chewing gum. Trivia Mirabel was ambidextrous. By the time we meet her in The Quest for the World-Breaker, her age is given only as "older than Four by a few years." One timeline written by the author places her departure from home at age 18 during the year 3877, making her 29 years old in her first appearance. Behind the Scenes A Butterfly's Tale mentions that Christabel had an older sister, but Mirabel's name and elaborate back story were not developed until The Quest for the World-Breaker. Mirabel will also appear in the fourth book, Embarrassment of Riches. Category:Pirates Category:Humans Category:Villains Category:Main Characters